Page 21 of One Day

I nod my head. “What do you need from me?”

“Nothing.” He shakes his head. “Just let me think about it, okay? I need a little more time before I jump in.”

“I can handle a little time,” I say, smiling. “And Cowboy? Just so you know, this isn’t going to change anything between us. Whether you say yes or no. I’m not going anywhere. I’m right where I want to be.”

“I know.”

“Good,” I say, leaning over to press my lips to his cheek, but he turns his head at the last second, catching my lips and me off guard. The kiss is quicker in comparison, and when I pull back, he leans his forehead against mine. “I’ll be here when you’re ready,” I whisper into the space between us, knowing, above all else, it’s what he needs to hear.

CHAPTER TEN

SONYA

It’s been less than twenty-four hours since Walker kissed me, and I still feel him. On my skin, on my lips. In my chest. He’s everywhere, and I wish I knew what to do with that. How to let time pass without him being a constant distraction. He’s taken up so much space, I’m not sure there’s any room left to dig myself out of this Walker-induced trance I’ve fallen into.

“Sunny! Over here.” Dylan waves me over from the middle row of my lecture hall. My lips part in surprise at the number of D1 hockey players currently crowding this room. I was expecting to come in today to discuss our initial ideas, maybe break into small groups to go over them, but instead, the class has doubled in size.

And Dylan is doing his very best to draw all the attention to himself.

“You didn’t mention you were going to be here.” I step into the row he’s chosen to make himself comfortable in. His dark hair is tousled, still slightly damp from the shower, telling me he and his teammates likely came here straight from practice. “Hi, you two,” I say with a smile, leaning forward to greet both Campbell and Fitz. “How was practice?”

“Fucking brutal,” Fitz answers for all of them, pulling his baseball cap down lower over his light brown hair to hide behind the brim as he sinks deeper into his seat.

I scrunch my nose up and look at Dylan. “Coach is frustrated with the current system fucking up where we’re supposed to be. We didn’t know we were going to be here until about half an hour ago,” he explains the details that Fitz’s answer lacked.

“That and we are playing like shit. Now we’re getting a week’s long punishment,” Fitz adds on, righting his hat again to meet my eyes.

“You’re not playing that bad,” I say, having been in the bleachers for their latest game. They may have lost, and maybe they weren’t at their best, but they are trying. All three of them shoot me a cold look. “Okay, yeah, maybe it was bad.”

“We suck,” Campbell says, raking his fingers through his hair. The movement drops me right back into Walker’s car, watching him do the exact same thing. While Campbell’s doing it out of frustration, Walker was doing it out of nerves. He was nervous.

Me. Our situation. The situation I put us in. It makes him nervous, and for whatever reason, that thrills me.

“What’s the face for?” Dylan dips his head towards me, lowering his voice. “You’re thinking about sex, aren’t you?”

“No.”

He chuckles. “So, yes.”

“Nope.” I shake my head, pressing my lips together. “My thoughts are completely pure. Haven’t thought about sex a day in my life.”

“You sure? Not thinking about getting dicked down by my boy, Soup over here?” he asks, nodding in Campbell’s direction.

I narrow my eyes. “Remind me to kill Bekah.”

“You know, he’d probably be up for it,” he says, ignoring my death threat. “He’s always had a soft spot for you.”

“It’s called being friends,” I argue, wanting to tell him to zip it. I can’t really blame Bekah for bringing it up in front of everyone. None of us are very good at keeping secrets from each other. We may have started out as friends, but at this point, they’re my family.

We don’t keep secrets. Even if sometimes we should.

“Then, care to share what’s going on in that big brain of yours?”

“Not particularly,” I say with a smile, and thankfully, I don’t get to because Professor Andrews claps her hands at the front of the room, drawing everyone’s attention forward.

Despite being unable to keep anything to myself, my kiss with Walker outside our house hasn’t made it to my friends. As badly as I wanted to tell them, it felt like something I should keep for the two of us. At least, right now.

“You may have noticed that we have some new people joining us today,” Professor Andrews says, moving to the podium where her laptop is set up while my classmates’ eyes move around the new bodies. “Coach Shay was kind enough to extend his players’ time to us today. We have taken it upon ourselves to assign you each two players to create your player profiles, but there are more of us than them, so they’ll be getting doubled up. Please be wary of their time. They are doing us a big favor here by volunteering their time, so make sure you are prepared and not wasting it. They are going to be very helpful, so use them and their time responsibly.”

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